Strength or Cunning
by Matt2317
Summary: Strength and cunning are two very different things. After the mission to wave Naruto realizes that it's not the strongest who survive in the ninja world, it's the the smartest. He will become a true ninja, not the flashy powerhouse. No, he will become the assassin from the shadows.
1. Chapter 1

**DISCLAIMER  
I do not own the Naruto universe. No profit is being made off this story.**

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**Being Smart and Being Strong Are Two Different Things**

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Some lessons in life take a long time to sink in. This was what Naruto realized when he and his team returned from their eye-opening mission to wave country. After the team's near death encounter with Gato and Zabuza, several thing began to gnaw at Naruto. How was he supposed to become Hokage when he was the weakest genin on the team.

"Sasule almost died on that bridge in wave. He was protecting me. Me. All because I was too weak. What if Sasuke had really died? Would I be able to forgive myself, or would I end up like Kakashi Sensei, being eaten alive by the guilt of losing a teammate?

All of these thoughts were running through Naruto's head as they wearily trudged back to the village. He was beginning to feel overwhelmingly inadequate. "I only know a handful of jutsus and I've been a genin for over six months. I bet Rock Lee, who can't even do jutsu knows more than I do. All Kakashi sensei ever has us do is team work building exercises." Something needs to change. I need to become stronger. Stronger to protect my team. To protect those precious to me.

As the team drew nearer and nearer to the village and as the sun set high in the sky Naruto's countenance shifted. He had come to realize what the true life of a ninja was really like and he felt woefully unprepared. But, with that realization came a sense of purpose. Before, his only real ambition was to become hokage, and he didn't even really know what that meant. He just wanted the villagers who had always ignored, or in some cases were outright hostile to recognize him. He had always seen the respect that everyone in the village gave to the hokage and in his young mind he wanted that. Now, after having a near death experience and seeing what being a ninja is truly like his priorities shifted.

Naruto wanted to live. He wanted to experience life to the fullest. He wanted to have adventure. He wanted to live long enough to fall in love, to raise a family. But now the truth beagn to sink in. In the dangerous world of the ninja, only the strongest lived to retirement. He knew that at the rate he was progressing that he wasn't likely to live past his sixteenth birthday.

During the trip back to the village Kakashi had been discreetly glancing at his young pupils. Sakura bordered on looking like she was in shock over the whole ordeal and stealing glances at her, "Sasuke kun." He half wondered if she was bipolar as he noticed the way her mood would change back and forth. One moment she would be fawning over her crush and the next she would be screeching at Naruto. He made a mental note to have her go to a psych eval.  
Sasuke was brooding as usual, but seemed a bit anxious as well. He probably wanted to get home as soon as possible so that he could start practicing with his newly awakened sharingan.

As for the young blonde, he was very quiet and downtrodden, which was unusual for the normally energetic blonde. As they entered the village gates he noticed that something had changed with his pupil. His shoulders squared, his stride lengthened and a smile slowly found its way on his face . He had found a new sense of purpose.

Naruto had realized that he needed to change. But how? When he arrived home he kicked off his shoes and slumped in his worn chair while he waited for his instant ramen to cook. While he waited his mind kept replaying the fight that he had with Zabuza over and over again. As he analyzed the fight his mind was drawn back to his genin test. While he was fighting Kakashi sensei all he ever did was spam clone and jump in. The only thought in his head was that if he made enough clones he could beat his sensei. How foolish he was. As he thought about how his sensei fought though he slowly realized something. Every move, every dodge or punch. Everything was coldly calculated and executed with as little of effort as possible. By the end of the exam Naruto was struggling for breath and Kakashi hadn't even paused in his reading. It wasn't the strongest that survived on the battlefield, it is the smartest. No, he decided. He didn't need to just get stronger, more than anything he needed to get smarter, more cunning. He needed to learn how to take command of his own life, his own destiny.

This was the lesson that Naruto learned that day, and it would forever alter the course of the elemental countries.

He was so lost in thought that he barely realized that his ramen was done and almost burnt it. After praying to the ramen gods for forgiveness he dug into his lunch. Oh how he had missed his ramen.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2. Breaking Habits  
**

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Naruto rose well before the sun. While he slept he had subconsciously made some resolutions. No longer would he be dead last. He knew he wasn't as smart as Sakura, or as strong as Sasuke. He was very far behind them in those aspects. That wouldn't get him down though. From this moment on he was going to think before he acted. Even though Kakashi didn't know it, he would be training Naruto. Not physically no, before every action he would ask himself, "How would Kakashi Sensei handle this situation?" He would observe those around him. He wouldn't give up. That was his nindo. Believe it!

Until recently, when he became a genin, Naruto had no real friends. The only people in his life that he trusted were Jiji-san, Iruka Sensei, Teuchi and Ayame from the ramen stand. None of them were his age though. Naruto never really had any close friends. Because of his lack of friends, Naruto had always acted out and pranked people. And as the japanese proverb goes, "The nail that sticks out gets hammered." And boy Sakura took every chance she got to do the hammering. Not even Kakashi Sensei would take him serious because of his boisterous, idiotic attitude. He didn't blame them for not taking him seriously. He could see why now. That would change soon though.

After his realization yesterday of how much he could learn just by watching those around him and thinking about a situation before he reacted, he decided to apply it in every aspect of his life. It was as if a whole new world had opened up to him. Things that he had always just accepted without question suddenly came under strict scrutiny. And like with everything in Naruto's life, he took it to the extreme. This didn't come easy to him though. His very being was the opposite. For his whole life whenever a situation would he he would just jump in without thinking and deal with the consequences later. This method often resulted in much embarrassment and cemented the already low opinion of those around him.

Naruto knew that he was no genius or natural- at anything. He wasn't stupid though. Most of his smarts were street smarts. He never had anyone to teach him what most other children learned so he had the teach himself.

He wasn't a genius at ninjutsu and taijutsu like Sasuke and he didn't have the book smarts like Sakura. His only real strength was his chakra capacity, and with his horrendous control even Sasuke could probably outlast him at that. Changes needed to be made. Normally when Naruto felt down on himself for his poor ninja skills his natural reaction would be to go to the training grounds and take his frustrations out on a training post. This time, because of his realization last night, he asked himself, "What would Kakashi sensei do if he wanted to get strong?." Naruto highly doubted that his sensei had learned over a thousand jutsu by punching a training post by himself.

So, Naruto concluded, "I'm going for a walk."

As he slowly walked around the village with his hands in his pockets and his eyes wide, being careful to take in everything he started to see things that he had never noticed before. He saw a man at a food stall chopping up vegetables in preparation for the coming lunch rush. Well, that was what he saw with his first glance. He decided to "see underneath the underneath" as his sensei would say. When he looked closer he noticed several things that painted a glimpse into the mans life. He saw the hardened almost broken look in the mans eyes. He had gone through something traumatic. Did he lose someone? Then he noticed the rhythmic way the man used the knife to slice the vegetables. That knife seemed to be an extension of his body. His use of the tool was too precise, too fluid to be a civilian. A ninja or samurai perhaps? He obviously was retired. He didn't look so old, no more than 30. Why would he have retired to become a simple food stand chef? Naruto kept looking. As the man turned and shuffled the the other end of the stall he noticed a slight limp. A flash of pain crossed the man's face as he moved as well. The flash was so fast that Naruto wouldn't have caught it if he hadn't already been looking for it. As Naruto glanced around he noticed that the stall looked newer than most of the surrounding buildings. It couldn't have been older than two years. So the man must have been injured recently. The adjustment was still fresh then.

As if the man could sense that someone was staring at him he suddenly glanced up and made eye contact with Naruto. Naruto looked away, guiltily. He felt as if he had seen a glimpse into the man's soul. He never thought that he could learn that much all from taking a few seconds to slow down and analyze the situation. What had he missed over the years?

So enraptured by what he had learned that he wasn't paying very much attention to where he was going and he ran face first into a pole. While getting back on his feet, his face flushing and discreetly looking around to see if anyone had seen his "dobe" moment he caught sight of his own reflection in the window of a clothing store.

As he was looking at his reflection in the glass pane, already imagining the shiner that he would have the next day, as well as inventing a story of an epic battle that he could tell to "explain" how he got said shiner, he had the thought, "why can't I do what I did with the man at the stall and 'see' what I can learn about myself?" So Naruto decided to look underneath the underneath in his own reflection. What he saw shocked him.

By looking at himself as someone on the street would look at him, he could now understand why people treated him the way they did. Obviously, the thing that immediately stuck out was the neon, bright orange jumpsuit that he was wearing. "What does that tell about me?" wondered Naruto. It's bright. It attracts attention. I have a shinobi headband, but I am wearing orange. Most shinobi wear muted colors. Colors that blend in with their environment. Colors that they can disappear with. "The only way I can disappear with this is if I make my opponent look directly at the sun." thought Naruto ashamedly. As he looked closer at his jumpsuit he noticed small rips and tears. There were stains and the hem looked like it was coming undone. "I look more like a street rat than a genin of Konoha." While dwelling on this he noticed something past his reflection on one of the racks in the store. There hanging on the rack was a plain hakama, white on the top and black on the bottom.

He was suddenly struck with a vision of himself, not what he was now, but as he could be. He was older, in his late teens. He was wearing that same hakama, with its wide flowing sleeves and traditional bottoms. His hair was longer, almost down to his chin, it framed his face elegantly. He was taller, with a lithe build and square shoulders. (Imagine Naruto with more of a Hyugga feel too him.) What caught his attention was his expression. It was filled with mirth and life, but when those eyes made contact one could feel them analysing every part of you, like he could see directly into your soul. He wasn't cold and stiff like the Hyuuga clan, but he did have that sense of quiet dignity and all seeing eyes, he just lacked their dojutsu. As Naruto absently gazed at the hakama still overcome with his vision of what he could become he decided that a change of wardrobe was in order, and he knew exactly what he wanted. If he was going to start down this path of change he needed to dress the part. The loud, brash-orange- Naruto would die this day. Today a man would rise. A man that would survive that harsh dangers of the shinobi world.

The problem was that none of the stores in Konoha would sell him anything. Part of the reason why he wore the jumpsuit in the first place was because those were the only things the store would sell him, and even then they cost him twice as much as he was sure they were worth. His first instinct was the barge into the store and loudly demand that they sell him what he wanted. He almost did it too, but caught himself at the last moment. No, he would think this through. Changing old habits is hard though.

He walked across the street and plopped down in the sidewalk. He asked himself what Kakashi Sensei would do in a situation like this, and the answer, a recurring theme he noticed, was to sit down and figure it out. He needed to learn how to solve his own problems. He was going to stare at the shop and think this through. His first idea involved pranking the owner to distract him while he ran in and took the hakima's. As he followed that train of thought he decided that wasn't such a good idea. Especially because the village doesn't take too kindly to thieves, especially those of the military force. He could see himself getting sent back to the academy for that.

"Agh! If only I was someone else I could just walk in there and buy it with no problems! I just can't go in as myself. Grr. This is so complicated. I can't go in as myself. Wait. . . I can't go in as myself. . . DOBE!" thought Naruto while smacking himself in the head. "Henge no jutsu!" Suddenly instead of a blonde haired blue eyed genin wearing a kill-me-orange jumpsuit, there was a brown haired, brown eyed civilian boy wearing a nondescript Hakama like the one in the store. With that solved, his quickly made his purchases, all the while cursing his own stupidity. He could already see benefits of his new way of thinking. **  
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	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3. Train hard, or train smart? Maybe both?

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While Naruto was sitting at Ichiraku's Ramen stand eating his lunch he was trying to figure out what he could do to become stronger. Obviously what he had been doing up to this point wasn't working so well. He started by examining everything thing that he already knew and what he had yet to learn. "Right" thought Naruto. "What do I already know about being a ninja? Well what is a ninja? A super powerful person that knows a bunch of jutsu?" Naruto tried to think back to his academy days about what Iruka Sensei had taught them about what a ninja really was. Luckily for Naruto that was one of the classes that he was actually there for. "Now what did Iruka say? Right, a ninja is an assassin. He is a spy, a tool of the village." The more that he thought about this the more things didn't seem to line up with what he had originally thought about what a ninja was. "Oh hell!" thought Naruto. "I don't even know what a ninja is!" He thought of some of the more prominent ninjas in the village. Maito Guy, Kakashi Sensei, the Hokage, Anko, Kurenai, all of them were powerhouses. They didn't look like trained assassins. They looked like showy warriors. The thing they had in common was this though. They all had prices on their heads. They had enemies. Sure they had feared reputations, but that came with a price.

The more that Naruto dwelled on this the more disturbed he became. If there was one lesson that life had taught Naruto it was that the nail that sticks out-gets hammered. Originally he had wanted to stick out. He wanted the attention. All he wanted was for people to recognize him. Now though, he wanted something else. He wanted to enjoy life. He wanted to live long, to find love, to be strong. Sure he still wished that people would recognize him for who he was; the jailor, not the captive, but he knew that he would have to go about things differently from now on.

Instinctively he knew that by standing out, people would notice him. They would remember him. If he was going to continue with this profession and have a good shot of surviving he would need to become a true ninja. He wouldn't be the flashy powerhouse like his senseis. No. He would become the silent killer. He would become a shadow. No longer would he rush into a fight head on. A ninja was never meant to be a front line warrior. They were supposed to be the assassins. Those that came and went as the wind. He would have no enemies because no one would know who he was. He would never fight fair. He would never fight head on if he could help it. It doesn't matter how strong you are or how many flashy techniques you know, or how fierce you are in battle if all it takes to kill you is a single drop of poison.

As Naruto started to form a new view of what a ninja really was his whole perspective started to change. He started to not just ask himself what would Kakashi Sensei do in a situation, but also what would a true ninja do? It seemed so easy to idolize the ones that stand out. There were many who had forgotten the true way of the ninja. They would spend all of their time training battle techniques and neglect the simple less flashy methods.

With that in mind he hurriedly finished his lunch and ran over to the training field. He knew that his team only had a week of leave to recover from their mission to wave and he didn't want to waste a minute of it.

When he arrived at the training field his first order of business was to go through all of the techniques that he already knew and try and figure out what he could do to improve. He started out with his favorite and main technique, Kage Bunshin no Jutsu. He quickly made ten clones and had them start to go through katas while he sat and watched them. He thought about how a true ninja would use the clones. He mentally made a list of everything that he knew about the clone jutsu and compared it with what he actually used them for. "Let's see" thought Naruto. "I can make multiple copies of myself. What else? Hmm. They can do jutsu too, just not too many or they'll run out of chakra. They get dispersed easily. One solid hit and poof." As the clones kept practicing the katas one of them slipped on the slick grass and fell face forward to the ground accidentally dispersing itself in a cloud of smoke. Naruto absently rubbed his head at the memory. "Wait a minute. My clone fell but I remembered it!" thought Naruto. His eyes widened as he finally figured out the training possibilities for his Kage Bunshin.

Almost on reflex he made the cross seal and started gathering his chakra, intent on making as many clones as possible. Right as he was about to discharge his chakra to make the clones he remembered the original plan. Old habits are hard to break. He released his hold on the jutsu and plopped back down. "Damn. This thinking things through nindo sure involved a lot of sitting down. Right, so back to the clone jutsu. So I can remember what my clones experience. Check. What else can I use them for?" Naruto wondered. Well there are the battle uses for the clones obviously, and I just figured out that they will help me train. What else are they for? What would a true ninja use clones for?"  
Naruto spent the rest of that afternoon analysing all the possible uses of the techniques he had. He never realized how versatile the techniques he knew could be. So far he only knew the 3 academy jutsu and the kage bunshin but with those alone he came up with at least 2 dozen new ways to use them.  
Now that he had finished analysing everything he knew the fun part would start. He was going to implement the new ways that he had come up with in using the techniques he knew and he was going to milk this village dry. No secret would be safe from him. He would have eyes everywhere.

After sitting down for so long thinking and planning Naruto was happy to be able to stand up and put the plan into action. He was almost giddy with what he was about to do. When all of this was over he would cement his image as the number one most unpredictable ninja. In his mind it was like planning a prank, albeit the most intricate and high stakes prank he's ever done before but a prank nonetheless. If there was one thing in the world that Naruto could honestly say he was good at it was pranking. He doubted that there were many full jounin in the village that could get away with some of the things that he had done. It is no ordinary feat to paint the faces on the hokage mountain in broad daylight whilst avoiding ANBU patrols. In that particular case his bright orange jumper was the perfect camouflage when timedd correctly with the midday sun.

He determinedly made the cross seal and with a giant poof there stood ten identical copies of Naruto. Each one had a specific task. Some scattered off into the other training fields to find a good hiding place and wait for someone to come and use it so he could observe their training methods. He didn't want to steal their techniques unless it was necessary, but he needed to find new things to learn, and what better way to do it.

Other clones hengied into nondescript civilians. Their mission was to go and buy notebooks. Each clone was to learn as much as it could about a clan and their techniques. They would then compile everything into the notebooks. Each clan would have it's own notebook. The last clone had a special assignment though. His was to come up with a new identity for Naruto. Something that he would assume when he needed to not be recognized. This clone would come up with a whole life. He would make new mannerisms, a new accent. Even a new personality. It had to be flawless for what he was planning.

As for the real Naruto, well he needed to train. He couldn't have his clones do everything. He had to balance all of the brain exercise with some good old fashioned physical exercise. Time for some taijutsu practice. When the week is up his team is hardly going to recognize him.


End file.
